Meaningful Learning with Technology

The purpose of the article Meaningful Learning with Technology is to inform teachers on the usefulness of technology in the classroom. Learning occurs with the persistence and understanding a specific task. Teachers today focus too much on teaching to the test rather than assuring that the students understand the material and can apply it to everyday life. The result? Students know how to take a test, that's it. These tests often do not exemplify the student's mastery in the content, ability to discuss it with their peers, or their ability to use it in their environment. The students conform to the one form of knowledge that is not even useful for their futures. Meaningful learners are “actively engaged by a meaningful task in which they manipulate objects and parameters of the environment they are working in and observing the results of the manipulation.” After this, it is important that students recognize their accomplishments and reflect back on what they learned so that they can come up with new ideas or plan on how they can further their knowledge. They then have goals and are cognitively motivated to fulfill the goal. The teacher can then facilitate their motivation by giving authentic tasks that relate their discoveries to real life. Teachers should also encourage cooperation and stray from individual learning to encourage collaboration. This is not exactly a new idea to me. Last semester I took Educational Psychology and was tested on this very material. However,I find it interesting how technology comes into play with this effective form of learning. So far, technology has been primarily used to summarize what other authors or websites have taught them; to compile them into a paper and turn it in without putting any original thoughts or ideas into the work. Technology should be used as tools to support knowledge construction, exploring knowledge, serve as an authentic context, support conversing with social media, and ultimately be an intellectual partner. It should be a tool, not a teacher. 

 

I like the author's view of content knowledge and pedagogical knowledge. He stresses that the two go hand in hand. A teacher may know how to teach, but if he or she does not know the content, they can not be successful in the transference and understanding of information. This is true the other way around. Being informed about how many types of knowledge there are blew my mind. It also made me realize the difficulties that teachers may have when instructing. Not only do these students have different learning styles that require various teaching methods, but the teacher themselves may only know the content from textbooks or lectures. They may be stumped with student's questions because their knowledge is limited and they themselves have not practiced the concepts they are trying to teach. This showed me that as a future speech pathologist who will be working in a very hands-on field, I need to be sure that my education involves practicing the information I study in the textbook. 

 

As a future speech pathologist, the most important concept that the author addressed to educators is the importance of recall in the student's learning journey. If the student is unable to recall information when it is needed, what good does the teacher do teaching it? Also, metacognition is an issue that teachers overlook when instructing in the classroom. Students often are clueless when it comes to learning how to learn the material. As a result, the teacher never knows how or what to teach. Teachers should use technology to facilitate learning, not to deliver learning. The teaching should remain the teacher's job and the computers should be used to think with.